India and South Africa engaged in a thrilling three match T20I series. South Africa showed great fight back after the 5-1 thrashing they got in the ODI series and made a good contest out of the T20I series. JP Duminy, Junior Dala and Christiaan Jonker troubled Indian team.
However, the Indian team prevailed thanks to them being better when it came to crunch situations. Players like Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Shikhar Dhawan and comeback man Suresh Raina flourished for India and we have the players’ ratings for the T20I series for you all.
Here are the Team India players’ ratings for T20I series:
Shikhar Dhawan- 8/10
Shikhar Dhawan scored 143 runs in three innings with a highest of 72, but the important thing here was his strike rate- 153.76. He was the reason why India scored heaps of runs in the first six overs. Dhawan also made sure that he set the tone for the other batsmen to follow.
Rohit Sharma- 3/10
Rohit Sharma had a forgettable tour of South Africa and ended it with 32 runs in 3 innings, with his best being 21 runs that came in 9 balls in the first ODI. He was dismissed for a duck by Junior Dala and couldn’t find anything going for him.
Suresh Raina- 7/10
Suresh Raina scored 89 runs in 3 matches with his best of 43 coming in the final T20I, which earned him a Man of the Match award too. Raina was given the no.3 spot in the batting order and the license to go after the bowling from ball one and he did exactly that. It was exciting to see him back in the Indian team.
Virat Kohli- 4/10
Virat Kohli missed the final T20I match due to stiff back. He had a cold T20I series with 27 runs in two matches. He has earned a well deserved rest for the Nidahas trophy in Sri Lanka and we will see him in IPL 2018.
Hardik Pandya- 5/10
Hardik Pandya had started the South African tour with an innings of 93 in the first Test and ended it with a good performance in the final T20I, where he bowled an economic spell to keep South Africa under pressure.
Manish Pandey- 8/10
Manish Pandey scored 121 runs in three innings with a highest of 79* and a strike rate of 142.35. Pandey showed that he could turn it on in the second T20I, after receiving flak for his slow innings in the first T20I. Pandey got an opportunity and he cashed it in big time.
MS Dhoni- 6/10
MS Dhoni scored his second T20I fifty in the second T20I of the series and scored 80 runs overall in the series. His keeping was brilliant as usual and Dhoni entertained us a lot with his advices from behind the stumps to his bowlers.
Yuzvendra Chahal- 3/10
Chahal had a T20I series that he would like to forget. He picked up just 1 wicket and had the ignominy of having the most expensive bowling figures by an Indian bowler in T20Is, as he went for 64 runs in 4 overs in the second T20I, as Heinrich Klaasen got stuck into him.
Shardul Thakur- 5/10
Shardul Thakur picked two wickets in two T20I matches and showed that he could be a worthy replacement to either Bumrah or Bhuvneshwar. He only needs to work on his fielding, as he had dropped a couple of catches in the outfield.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar- 9/10
Bhuvneshwar Kumar became the first Indian bowler to pick up five wicket hauls in all the three international formats. He picked 7 wickets in three matches with a best bowling of 5/24. Bhuvneshwar Kumar was the bowler of the tour for India in Tests and T20I formats.
Jasprit Bumrah- 5/10
Jasprit Bumrah was at his best in his favorite T20 format. Though he picked up just one wicket, Bumrah kept the runs down in death overs in the two games he played.
Dinesh Karthik- 4/10
Dines Karthik played just one game and hit 13 runs with 3 fours. His fielding in the outfield was safe and Karthik will be looking forward to getting more chances in upcoming matches.
Akshar Patel- 3/10
Akshar Patel played just one match and bowled one over for 16 runs. He could have got a wicket first ball, that of JP Duminy, however Shardul dropped the catch and JP Duminy got stuck into him.
Jaydev Unadkat- 5/10
Jaydev Unadkat took 3 wickets in two matches he played, but he was dropped for the final match due to him going for runs in the death overs of the second T20I match, which India lost.
